


Old Names

by burglebezzlement



Category: Wynonna Earp (TV)
Genre: Amnesia, Earp Homestead, Gen, episode tag: 1.10, post 1.10
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-05
Updated: 2016-06-05
Packaged: 2018-07-12 10:58:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7100152
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/burglebezzlement/pseuds/burglebezzlement
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eve comes to the Earp homestead. Episode tag for 1x10.</p><p>
  <em>On the drive to her home, the woman who called herself Courtney tells Eve that her name is Wynonna instead. She studies Eve carefully as she says it, like she is looking for some reaction.</em>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Old Names

On the drive to her home, the woman who called herself Courtney tells Eve that her name is Wynonna instead. She studies Eve carefully as she says it, like she is looking for some reaction. 

There is none. Eve is used to women losing their names when they came to the commune. When you were reborn, under the altar of the forest, you left your name and your past behind. You were shorn of your commitments. Of any attachments that might have kept you in the outside world.

Most of the women remembered their old names, anyway, and whispered them to one another in the dark, after the fires were quieted for the night. Kept them to their hearts. They shared them with one another, a litany of past lives.

A few of the women wanted to be reborn. Wanted to leave their pasts behind. 

Eve never knew which group she belonged in. Never remembered her old name. 

Now they pull up the home of the woman who is named Wynonna and not Courtney, a tiny house in the gathering darkness which is welcome for Eve after so long in a great house of secrets. The lights shine out.

On the step, a woman stares at Eve like she knows her. The bottle she holds in her hand drops, shatters.

“ _Willa_.”

Eve looks back. She does not know this name, any more than she knew the names Courtney or Wynonna or Waverly or Nicole. 

Wynonna runs from the car to the older woman, putting an arm around her and leading her inside. Eve can hear them talking, but cannot hear what they say.

The other woman on the porch — Wynonna told Eve that she had a sister, Waverly, that they lived together and that Eve would be meeting her. 

Eve stands by the truck while Waverly stares at her, like something impossible just happened, and then shakes her head and comes forward to Eve.

“Come inside,” Waverly says. She moves a hand like she’s going to touch Eve’s back, but then holds away at the last moment. “You’ve had a long day. You must want to get cleaned up.”

Inside, Wynonna and the older woman are at the kitchen table, talking in low, tight voices, while Waverly leads Eve through the house.

It has colors other than those of the forest.

The bathroom is unfamiliar, but Wynonna comes and shows Eve how the arrangements work. “Much better than a chamberpot,” Wynonna says, showing how the toilet flushes.

Waverly brings Eve clothing, a giant stack of it, and allows her to choose before her washing. Eve has spent so long in white that she does not know what color she should feel. Waverly helps her select a long, warm skirt and a shirt with long sleeves and silver-gilt print. 

When Eve has washed and dressed, the clothing makes her feel like she is standing apart, individual, which is not unwelcome, but her shoulders feel bare and cold without the protection of the fur.

Waverly brings Eve downstairs, back to the kitchen, which is warm. There is food which is unfamiliar. 

Wynonna introduces the older woman as Gus, aunt to Wynonna and Waverly. Wynonna studies Eve closely, like she did when she gave Eve her new name. 

The woman called Gus studies Eve closely, too, but whatever they are expecting to see is missing because they exchange a look with one another while Waverly serves out dishes of something with potatoes and meat and vegetables from a small pan. 

Eve is used to cooking for her sisters, which meant large pans and giant stew pots. They kept their own garden, hewn out of the pine barrens, for the summer months. Iska provided great bags of flour and other essentials, like salt, and then sometimes meat was brought from the forest. The sisters cooked together, but Iska did not trust when sisters who grew too close to one another, in the task of preparing the meals, and broke their tasks frequently.

This food is oddly spiced but not displeasing. There is also water, which is kept cold with cubes of ice.

After the food is finished, Wynonna pours herself something from a bottle and Aunt Gus glares at her. 

“What?” Wynonna asks. “I think I’ve earned a little happy hour today.”

“You could keep your wits about you,” Aunt Gus says. 

Eve rises to help Waverly with the dishes, while Wynonna and Aunt Gus stay at the table. Once the chore is complete (and how strange, washing dishes for only four people), Waverly puts down a plate containing sweets, with chocolate, which is something Eve and her sisters only tasted on the rare occasions when Iska was in a good mood. Eve watches for Waverly and Wynonna and Gus to take cookies before taking one herself.

Eve eats an entire cookie by herself, and then notices that there are more cookies left. She sneaks one more cookie into the pocket of Waverly’s skirt to eat that evening if she is hungry. She doesn’t think Waverly would object but she doesn’t want to risk asking and angering her. 

It is Wynonna who notices the yawns that Eve thought she had hidden from the others’ eyes.

“Come on,” she says. “We’ll get you settled for the night. We’ve got an extra bed.”

Wynonna exchanges a look with Waverly which Eve cannot read.

Upstairs, Wynonna leads Eve into a room with slanting walls which run down to knee walls. There is a small bed, set at an angle in the room so that either side is free. 

Wynonna bends over and touches something, and tiny lights, like fireflies, but steady and clear in color, flash into existence, in an inverted arch above the bed, like the boughs of the altar of the forest in the room of rededication.

“Lights,” Wynonna says. She shows Eve how to call them forth and how to make them go away.

Eve sits down on the bed, which is low to the ground. It is spread with linens. This room — this house — is warm even though there is no fire.

She will miss the noise of her sisters. It will be strange, sleeping alone in a room. But this room feels friendly. It feels like a space which welcomes her.

“I don’t know how to make you comfortable,” Wynonna says.

“This place is very comfortable,” Eve says, looking up at Wynonna.

Wynonna looks uncertain. “You know where the bathroom is,” she says. “No chamberpot. House rule.” 

She waits like she expects Eve to laugh, but Eve nods instead. It is helpful to know the rules.

Wynonna studies Eve for a moment longer, and then sits down beside her on the bed. “Look, Eve, I know this must be hard for you. You had to kill a man today. I know that’s not going to be easy. I get it, I mean, trust me, I of all people get it. My room is right across the hall, if you need to talk to me. Or anything. Any time. We’re here for you.”

“He wasn’t a man,” Eve says.

Wynonna hesitates, and nods. “Yeah. He wasn’t.”

“He was a monster.” 

Eve knew this from the beginning. Some of the sisters didn’t realize for a time, or grew to love the monster in spite of what it was. But Eve knew from the moment she was brought in. Could feel it like a burn in her bones. 

She had forgotten so much, when she arrived. But this thing she always knew for sure. And when the time came when she could no longer protect her sisters from the monster, she felt no sorrow in doing what was right.

Wynonna sits with her a bit longer, then, before leaving her. She shuts the door carefully, like Eve is already asleep and she fears waking her.

Eve eats her cookie before getting under the covers. She will work out the rules of this new world.

Under the firefly lights, Eve sleeps.


End file.
